If He Dies
by Arisprite
Summary: Fai, immediately after Mokona transports them all away from a crumbling Celes, cannot process what just happened. All he knows is there is blood everywhere, and Kurogane's hand - remaining hand - is still tangled in his collar. Post Celes, missing scene. Oneshot.


Title: If He Dies...

Author: Arisprite

Summary: Fai, immediately after Mokona transports them all away from a crumbling Celes, cannot process what just happened. All he knows is there is blood everywhere, and Kurogane's hand - _remaining _hand - is still tangled in his collar.

Warning: Blood and description (albeit a pretty panicked and distressed description with a lot of run on sentences) of a massive injury.

A/N: A small oneshot. Yay panicked stream-of-consciousness!

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><p>Fai almost didn't notice the rushing-tingling-protection feeling of Mokona's dimension crossing. His body was thrumming with the after effects of so much magic, thundering with the pain of scraping the dregs of his past the point of his limits. There was still blood in his mouth, there was blood in the air and on his face, and it wasn't his…<p>

Yes, they'd all escaped, but...

His own magic was in a tight knot behind them, closing around what used to be the country of Celes, but was now nothing but void. He was truly leaving behind his past, and what had happened…

_What had happened?_

His brother Fai's body crumbling as Sakura's collapsed…

Ashura-ou laying dead on the ground…

And...Kurogane…

Wide eyes, short of breath, still choking on blood, Fai looked around, even in the pressure, the noise, of interdimensional travel. Mokona's magic surrounded them, held them safely in its grasp. It had only been seconds since…

Kurogane's right hand was still clenched in the collar of his coat. His other arm…

"No," Fai whispered, and the sound was blown away by the magical roar.

It was gone. Sliced away by his own sword, a little below the shoulder. Blood was flowing, even in the pause of Mokona's magic. Kurogane hadn't reacted yet, hadn't realized the pain, adrenalin still making him strain to hold onto Fai's coat, even though he wasn't going anywhere. He was here. Kurogane, (again) had made sure he survived, and had given a part of himself (quite literally) to make that happen.

_Damn him._

Damn him, but Fai wasn't leaving. Not again.

Shaking black gloved hands reached up and touched the wrist at his throat.

They landed with a jolt (Mokona was panicking too) and the shudder made Kurogane's hand slip from his shoulder, slip from his grasp and fall to the suddenly solid ground. Time began again, and Kurogane made a horrid noise somewhere between a grunt and a whimper. It cut through Fai's already overwhelmed emotions like a cleaver. Fai couldn't breathe.

The magic cleared around them, and Fai let tears overflow his eye-had they ever really stopped?

"Kurogane!" He gasped. His voice was rough, breaking, panicked. Kurogane was in pain, he was bleeding and this blood -like all the blood sliding down his throat in the past months- was for _him._ For Fai. For _Yuui_. For that poor, pathetic, misfortunate child who'd killed his-

Who _hadn't_ killed his twin-

And Kurogane's arm, his stump, was glistening red, so red, and bleeding still. Kurogane had his face screwed up, teeth bared, breathing quickly, and Fai dove forward. He almost knelt on top of the other man, in his haste to shove his hands, gloved in leather and ineffective, against the wound.

_Stop the blood stop the blood_

It quickly soaked the already spattered coat, the fur sleeves growing dark with Kurogane's life force.

His food.

Fai bit down, growling against the vampire instincts. Instincts that told him that he shouldn't let so much go to waste. This was Kurogane! He was _dying_, and with the thought any hunger turned to nausea.

Kurogane groaned at his pressure. Fai panted, words spilling out, sobbing.

"Oh, please, please, no no no," He didn't know what else he said, begging Kurogane not to leave him.

_Was this how Kurogane felt on Tokyo?_

Distantly, he heard voices, saw shapes moving around him. Startled shouts, stern voices, and panicked explanations...his friends and others. His own sobbing, babbling prayers.

Then, there were hands on him. People trying to move him, away from Kurogane, away from Syaoran and Sakura and Mokona and everything he'd come to love in this universe. Fai was gone. Ashura was dead. _No, please, they're all I have left!_

The blood began to flow faster as his hands were jostled away from the wound, and Fai screamed, anger and despair opening his mouth. He bucked, scrambling with all his strength to stay by the man's side.

Slight awareness slid open Kurogane's eyes, they'd been closed, he realized. A sideways glance, a quirk of the lips, and then Kurogane went limp. Fai did too, for a moment, fear paralyzing him. His attackers took the opportunity to drag him backwards, allowing strangers to surge into his place.

His own weakness felled him. His magic's empty scrape of insufficiency in his chest, his soul. The fear, the panic, the trauma, and he couldn't fight them off. Faceless, mask-wearers, speaking in low tones in words he could understand but not comprehend. They lifted Kurogane onto a stretcher. Sakura too. Syaoran was speaking, coming towards him with worry on his face, but they ignored him too, they were taking all of them away from him.

Sobs gripped his chest anew, and he jerked forwards once more-towards Kurogane, towards the man who'd saved him twice now. Couldn't he save him now?

"Please, please…" He begged, certain if Kurogane left his sight, that he would die, he would die and it would be all his fault, again, and… "Please, don't take him from me… If he dies, I'll..."

He didn't know what. He wasn't really asking the masked men, as they were leaving, carrying Kurogane away. He said it anyway, begging someone, anyone, the heavens, the gods to hear him. They never had before, but…

Then, something cool and soft brushed his flushed cheek.

"Wha…?" He turned, gulped and his eye focused through a haze of tears on a familiar face. A face he remembered from a brightly colored world, but that Kurogane knew from much longer ago than that. She was smiling gently, through there was concern and surprise around her eyes. Her hand touched his cheek again.

"Don't worry, Fai. Kurogane will not die." There was iron in her voice, cloaked in silk. A gladness so powerful as to make him dizzy rushed through his whole being. It had paid off. The price he'd agreed to before Celes, when he'd only been thinking of his companions making it away safely. The witch had done it. Kurogane was in the care of those who loved him.

"Tomoyo-hime," He gasped, light headed, out of breath. She smiled again.

"You're all safe." She said. Fai dropped his head. Relief overwhelmed every other emotion. Blackness shrouded his vision, and he knew nothing for a while.

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><p>AN: So, you all were absolutely great with my last fic, and I wanted to let you know that I'm working on another! A prequel to Two Motives, set a few weeks after the end of the manga, when the gang travels to Piffle to get Kurogane's new arm. Deals with Kuro-honey's arm, Fai's possible continuing vampirism, and whatever I can get Syaoran to do (the little butt is very reluctant to get involved in the antics of Fai and Kurogane). Look for it soonish!


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